When Wes Clark Took Himself Off The Veep List
John McCain's team held a conference call this morning seeking to squeeze another day out of Wes Clark's Sunday remark that McCain's service doesn't necessarily qualify him to be commander in chief.
"I don't think riding in a fighter plane and getting shot down is a qualification to be president," Clark said during an appearance on CBS' "Face the Nation."
Today on the McCain camp call, VA Sen. John Warner, former Secretary of the Navy, said he was shocked by Clark's assertion. And he noted that for Barack Obama to allow such a comment shows "poor judgment."
"I was utterly shocked when I saw this yesterday, knowing Clark as I have, that he would in such a disrespecful way attack one of his fellow officers," Warner said.
Lt. Commander Carl Smith, USNR (Ret.) called Clark's comment, "unworthy, unseemly for someone of his stature and for a campaign that prides itself on the good judgment of its candidates."
Also on the call were Col. Bud Day, USAF (Ret.), a Medal of Honor recipient, and Lt.Col. Orson Swindle, USMC (Ret.). The group pushed the notion that Clark's remark reflects Team Obama's thinking about the presumptive GOP nom -- and is further evidence that Obama's campaign represents politics as usual, despite claims to the contrary.
It's worth noting here that on the stump Obama routinely praises McCain's military service and has repeatedly called him an "American hero."
(JENNIFER SKALKA)
So Bud Day, who starred in the SwiftBoat ads against Kerry, is denouncing the SwiftBoating of McCain?
Now that's funny!
In what way was Clark's statement wrong?
So because two GOP leaning retired military dudes were offended, it means that Gen. Clark can't be Obama's VP? Or because Obama prefaces his attacks on McCain with an "I honor his service statement," even though Clark also made a similar prefacing statement?
I know you beltway blowhards like to tell people who they can or cannot pick, but the fact of the matter is that what Clark said is what a lot of vets (and other Americans) are thinking: that just because John McCain was a POW who didn't give in to the VietCong doesn't mean he a) has any relevant foreign policy experience over Obama and b) his POW experience would make him any better of a president than Obama.
In my view, Clark enhanced his position. He can say things about McCain that no other VP candidate could given that he got medals for combat in Vietnam and then 20-something years later successfully lead a multi-national force involving ethnic conflict (inc. Muslims) with ZERO American casualties.
Other than being in the senate for longer, McCain has no more relevant experience than Obama. And even that experience is dubious, given how he voted on the Iraq war, torture, and Kosovo.
Clark is being lambasted for having he audacity to ask a very reasonable question: how does being a POW for five years qualify you to be president?
If anything, it's likely that such a prolonged horrific, experience would give you a distorted view of the world, warp your judgment and make you so unstable that one day you would be dead against torture and later you'd be pretty much okay with it. Or become suddenly enthusiastic about locking suspects up in Guantanamo and throwing the constitutional keys away.
In any case, Democrats have absolutely no reason to allow McCain to make his service out as a sacred untouchable cow. I want a reporter to ask him straight "what lessons did you learn in the Hanoi Hilton that you will apply to your foreign policy?"
Remember, George W. Bush was also a Vietnam era figher pilot.
Clark just likes to hear himself talk. He never got used to having the taxpayers provide a lavish General's lifestyle. He still thinks everyone should salute him and call him Sir. Go back to Arkansas, Clark, your girl lost.
Swift-boating? Trouble is that the "swift-boat" charges were all TRUE. Kerry didn't, hasn't, and couldn't, release his full military records because it might have confirmed things that were even more damaging than the swift-boat charges ... such as the truth about his "decorations" and his discharge.
Unlike Kerry-and-the-swiftboaters, with Sen. McCain, we know the truth. It is the spin of the truth and the denigration of his ordeal that is at issue. Most of the people casting stones have no concept about his sacrifice. In many cases these same people, their sons, their fathers, grandfathers, all managed to avoid service. And it almost seems that their collective sense of shame requires them to attack those who served.
Funny...but on the Wash. D.C. mall during Memorial Day, I couldn't find anyone celebrating the 40th anniversary of some anti-vietnam rally. I wonder if there is a lesson in that fact?
An observation for Jack Williams...truth seems to only be in the eye of the beholder. It seems you have a large boulder in your eyes.
Clark was being his rash and boastful self again. Its true, his candidate lost (Hillary), so he should just go home. THe more he blabbs around, the more you look up HIS record and how bad it looks - that is, rashly endangering the world viv a vis the soviets according to researchers and then rashly and boastfully bombing sarajevo, even on easter as they were in church. Clark's worse than Bush!